The Twin Paradox
by KeepCalmFanFicExists
Summary: Lord Voldemort comes back to Britain after his ten year long travels and decides to spend the first night at the house of Cygnus Black. Someone is waiting for him there though, and they are in a funny mood. Is he losing his mind, or is it something more sinister going on?


_Written for Challenge 96 of Bellatrix Lestrange: The Dark Lord's Most Faithful Forum. The prompts to be used were "corruption", "identical twins" and "library"._

_Disclaimer: I only own the paranoia in here, not Harry-Potter-Land._

Lord Voldemort landed on the familiar ground of Dover lightly. After ten years of traveling and exploring all kinds of magic, it was nice being back. And this time for good. It was high time he established his domination on the world and starting from home would be both easier and more enjoyable. First thing he had to do was to re-initiate contact with his old pureblooded classmates. Their influence and wealth would be crucial for his campaign, when diplomacy fails corruption is the best way to go. And since he had heard some of them had children already, recruiting young members would be easy.

Standing on the wet grass, he pondered in his mind where he should spend the night. It was already quite late and he was sick and tired of pathetic inns with questionable company. He couldn't check in a more respectable place, like the Leaky Cauldron, for all he knew Dumbledore was playing poker with the landlord every weekend; he tended to do gross things like that.

He could visit one of his old followers right away and "ask" for hospitality. A manor was far better than a motel-by-the-hour and he could start with his plan tonight. After some debate he concluded Cygnus Black and his family would be granted this honour. A moment later he was standing outside a spectacular mansion knocking on the door.

At first it seemed like no one was home, every window was dark and no sounds came from the grand hall. And then a light lit up in the third floor of the South Wing and the front door swung open. Voldemort was taken by surprise, he had never been greeted like this before. But if he was to ask for hospitality, he couldn't afford comments or sarcastic remarks. The hall was empty too, without the usual house-elf scrubbing the floor or polishing the furniture. Repressing a sigh, he headed towards the stairs and the library; he knew how to find it, he had spent a couple of Christmas holidays as a guest here. In front of the heavy mahogany doors he stopped momentarily. With some self-restrain he knocked before entering.

The library was exactly like he remembered it. Tall walls covered in bookshelves that over time had bended from their heavy, precious load. A big desk and a few more tables scattered around, all with sweet honey highlights from the crackling fire reflected on them. The only difference was that the leather sofa closest to the fireplace was occupied by... two young girls.

Voldemort blinked to make sure his eyesight was as exceptional as always. Why, yes, it was fine and indeed the girls were there. Only they were... similar, very similar. Both had the same porcelain white skin, the same shiny ebony waist-length hair and the exact shade of dark blue eyes. Even their dresses were the same! He blinked again and opened his mouth to say something, but the girl on the left spoke first.

"Hello, sir," she begun, "would you mind telling us who you are-"

"-and what you want in our house?" her... identical sister finished the sentence without a pause.

"Your house?" he repeated, "I was about to ask you the same thing."

"This is our father's house-," the first twin started again.

"-and we are Bellatrix and Canella Black, Bella and Ella for short."

"We are identical twins," they concluded in unison.

"Yes, I noticed," Voldemort muttered, sounding a bit annoyed. "Bella and Ella, nice rhyme."

"It is," Ella said serenely, "Bella goes first, because she's older. Three minutes."

"Indeed, three whole minutes older. But, sir, you haven't told us who you are."

"No, I have not..." Voldemort's voice trailed off. He decided on sort of telling the truth. "I happen to be an old classmate of your father's back at Hogwarts. While he stayed here having you, I travelled the whole world."

"Ohhh," they exclaimed, their eyes lighting up identically as they both clapped their hands and started singing, "tell us more, tell us more!"

"Where did you go?"

"What did you see?"

"Was it dangerous?"

Voldemort blinked again. It was not the overly-excited behaviour of the children that made him uncomfortable, that had always been the reason he hated kids. It was just that... they were too similar. He had seen identical twins before, a couple of four-year-old girls had been abandoned by their parents at the orphanage when he was eight. The orphans had been intrigued by their identical status and tended to mix them up. Soon enough though he had discovered differences easy to spot; Aileen's hair was a darker shade of red than her sister's and she had a tear-shaped spot in her green eyes, while Nessa had less freckles and was slightly shorter. They were close, everyone could see that, they were usually together at sewing, always whispering to each other, and even went to work for the same house later, the one as a maid and the other as the cook's assistant.

On these twins, though, Bella and Ella, his eyes couldn't find any physical differences. As for the act they were doing... The sisters were finishing each other's sentences, speaking the same lines at the same time, their jaws dropping on cue, even now that he came to look at their clothes better, their dresses were ruffled at the same place. As he started telling them the less adult of his adventures, excluding immensely Dark Magic and killings, the odd feeling became more intense. Also, with some disappointment, he came to the conclusion Cygnus' daughters weren't very bright either. They giggled a lot, had difficulty remembering where Australia was and, when he told them he had encountered a Chinese Fireball while looking for a magical cave close to the Great Wall of China, Bella's eyes took a Galleon size as she asked: "did you die?"

It was a shame, because both Cygnus and Druella were perhaps the brightest in the school. After himself, of course. Still, in their blissful stupidity they were able to give him information on their father, his involvement at the Ministry and the other pureblooded families. He was glad to know that even though Cygnus had two more daughters, the Lestranges and Malfoys had sons. He could start with those.

When he had milked all the information he could out of the twins, he concluded he had enough of this show and sent them to bed right after they, in turn, had ordered a house-elf for a room for him in one voice.

* * *

><p>It was the next morning and Voldemort and Cygnus were sitting comfortably at the patio having breakfast. Cygnus Black had been surprised, yet glad, to see his... well, he himself wasn't sure what his old classmate was to him. All the same, Lord Voldemort always came up with the best plans and ideas, it was an honour to have him there. He was actually having a vague urge to show his... lord what one of his daughters could do. Admittedly, he hadn't been delighted to have so many daughters, but one apparently was worth more than all of the others' sons put together. So he started discreetly.<p>

"My lord, if you don't mind, my daughters would like to join us for breakfast."

"Ah, of course, of course, I already had the pleasure-," Voldemort paused momentarily. The twins had behaved too disturbingly for his well-structured mind, he couldn't help himself from making a slightly unkind joke to Cygnus. "The pleasure of meeting your eldest _daughter," _he emphasized the singular. "A charming young lady, and very pretty at that, I should add."

"Yes, isn't she?" answered Cygnus happily, glad to hear good words on his child from him. "Bella was all alone here last night, can't say I wasn't worried about it, she tends to be a bit difficult at times, but she seems to have grown up a lot lately, welcoming you here, offering hospitality like a real lady."

Voldemort's eyes showed surprise for less than a second, then he covered it up. Wasn't Ella supposed to be here then?

"Difficult, you say? Well, she did look a bit..." he started looking for the right adjective.

"Cold?" Cygnus helped tiredly. "She is usually like that, yes, I am very sorry, my lord, she is brilliant though."

Voldemort was taken aback even more. He had come up with a variety of characterizations on the twins and none of those included "cold"; silly perhaps, even annoying, but not cold.

"I was actually going for peculiar mannerisms, " he began having been struck by an idea. "She introduced me to her imaginary friend, she said it was her twin sister, Canella, she even pretended she was sitting right there with us talking. It was odd, indeed."

That should be enough to freak Cygnus out, his daughter calling her twin "imaginary". He prepared himself for the storm to come. The Black's eyes opened widely as expected.

"She told you she has an imaginary friend called Canella?" he asked in disbelief.

"Yes, she even told me they were identical twins," Voldemort answered innocently.

"Well, she has never talked about an imaginary twin-friend before," the man said matter-of-factly.

"Sorry?"

"Seriously, Bella never mentioned any imaginary friends, she never plays with the other kids, she is very protective of her little sisters, but, to be honest, I never thought she wanted a friend. I was a bit worried about that, but if she wants a friend why not ask for one? Poor kid, all this time..." Cygnus continued musing sadly, while Voldemort was starting to feel sick. He opened his mouth and closed it again when he realized he didn't have anything to say. What on earth was going on? Why wasn't Cygnus reacting? Why wasn't he even _recognizing_ his daughter's name?

If last night he had wondered if the girls were so similar due to the long trip and his disappointment they were so average, this moment's confusion led him to believe he was far more tired and sick than he thought. He couldn't die, but this... this was bad.

"So- so you have never heard of the name Bellatrix came up with? Canella?" he asked as quietly as he could.

"No, never. Ella runs in the family, that's why my poor girl chose it, I guess, but never with that suffix..."

Voldemort nodded weakly. A knot was stuck in his throat. He coughed lightly.

"Why don't you call her here for breakfast, she may want to share her story."

"Yes, yes, that's exactly what I'm going to do."

Two minutes later Druella came in the room followed by three little girls, all staring at the floor scared. Voldemort scanned them quickly and his eyes stuck to the only ebony-haired one. Yes, _one_. She was identical to the girls from last night, the only difference was she was wearing a morning dress now. If he hadn't met anyone at all last night, how could he have gotten the details of her appearance so accurately? Then again, how could he be seeing two people instead of one?

But as Druella walked forward leaving her daughters standing behind, Bellatrix' head shot up, eyes burning with triumph, a malicious smirk on her lips. She had planned this, she had done it all, she wanted to make him believe he was going mad.

Fury and embarrassment filled him in a moment and the next they gave their place to admiration. And when Bellatrix' lips uncovered her teeth, an odd fascination for this vicious little animal took over.

Yes, he had been very wrong about her, indeed. Who cared about the sons of the Malfoys and Lestranges, they were going to have a lot of fun together. A smirk was drawn on his face too.

_A/N: Thank you for reading, please let me know what you think._

_Canella is a real word, means cinnamon in Greek and sometimes it's used as a name for females (50 years ago, but anyway). It was the only name that contained Ella and also started with a "C". :P_


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